Spain's dual crises of social and economic unrest,
paired with an unprecedented loosening of the bonds that tie it together
as a nation, make it perhaps the most apt microcosm of today's European
Union - warns think-tankThousands of miners entered Madrid
last week, singing loudly, setting off fireworks and waving signs and
banners. Some walked as far as 250 miles from the mining regions along
Spain's northern coast. The marcha negra - black march - ended with a
violent clash with police in front of Spain's Industry Ministry
building. Over the ensuing days - labourers and civil servants rallied
throughout the city, blocking streets and railways. Some women wore
black veils as though for a funeral. The target of these protests was
the austerity package passed last Wednesday, by the embattled government
of Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy - whose future, the miners
reminded him, was "darker than our coal".
The €65bn package
consists of European Union-recommended tax increases, public sector
spending cuts, city and regional government overhauls and the
liberalisation of the transportation sector. The hope is that these
measures will help the country, having recently requested up to €100bn
in European aid for its banks and avoid an international state bail-out
along the lines of Greece, Ireland and Portugal. With government
revenues and housing prices falling and debt on the rise though, it may
well prove to be a doomed effort.
And yet as workers from
throughout the country converge on Madrid for protests - a second,
altogether different, movement is gathering strength in one of Spain's
wealthiest autonomous regions - Catalonia. There, thousands have
gathered throughout the summer in towns and villages to call for much
more than an end to austerity. Their goal is complete independence for
their region of over 7.5 million from the Spanish state. Catalonia, like
the Basque Country, has a long and complicated history with
Castillian-dominated Spain. But the crippling economic crisis,
resentment over transfers of roughly 8 to 9 per cent of Catalonia's
gross domestic product to poorer parts of Spain - and incidents such as
recent Spanish Supreme Court opposition to Catalan language-immersion
programmes in the region's pre-schools has combined to form a
three-layered gift for the independentistes.
According to recent
polls conducted by the Centre d'Estudis d'Opinió, 51 per cent of all
Catalans would vote for independence from Spain in a hypothetical
referendum. This represents a six-point percentage increase in the past
four months alone. When asked the broader question of what Catalonia
should be vis-à-vis Spain, 34 per cent said "independent" - a 20-point
percentage increase since the pre-crisis days of 2006. Following the
release of the polling data, Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Sáenz
de Santamaría called on all Spaniards to understand that with the
country's other concerns "now must be a time for stability". Catalan MP
Josep Antoni Duran sought to downplay the results, arguing that a
majority of Catalans would still prefer increased autonomy over outright
independence.
Yet between now and September, more than 200
pro-independence rallies and marches are scheduled to take place across
Catalonia; building up to a massive demonstration on September 11, the
region's national holiday. The plan from there, according to the Catalan
National Assembly - or ANC - will be to organise a referendum on
Catalonia's status for the following year and proclaim full independence
in 2014. "For us, independence is a question of dignity," says Carme
Forcadell, head of the ANC. "We don't want to live on our knees within
Spain when we could stand on our own feet in Europe."
Spain, with
unemployment rates of close to 25 per cent, youth unemployment over 50
per cent, increasing emigration and expectations of long-term recession
and austerity - should be watched very carefully by policy-makers in
Brussels and Washington. Its dual crises of social and economic unrest,
paired with an unprecedented loosening of the bonds that tie it together
as a nation, make it perhaps the most apt microcosm of today's EU. As
the country drifts towards a possible state bail-out - the tightening
screws of la crisis are threatening to drive fissures through every
aspect of its social, political, and economic life; and push it into the
uncharted waters of possible, although still unlikely, disintegration.
During
the recent Euro 2012 football tournament, the uglier side of
pan-European tensions was often on display. "Without Angie, you wouldn't
be here," chanted German fans during the game with Greece, referring to
German Chancellor Angela Merkel. "We'll never pay you back," replied
the Greeks. At a wedding I recently attended in Catalonia, I found only
one fellow guest tracking the status of the ongoing match between Spain
and France and he was quietly rooting for France. "We Catalans are tired
of seeing our tax money go to Spain," he said, cringing as news of
another Spanish goal popped up on his phone. "I guess you could say we
understand how Germany feels."
Nicholas Siegel is a senior
programme officer at the German Marshall Fund of the United States
think-tank, which originally published this paper as part of its Transatlantic Take series
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